Taylor Phinney won the Stage 4 criterium at Tour of the Gila on Saturday. A member of the Trek-Livestrong development team, it's the second win in a row for the under-23 development team.
Phinney's teammate Jesse Sergent won Friday's individual time trial.
After Saturday's 43-mile criterium, Levi Leipheimer still held the overall lead by 59 seconds over Tom Danielson. David Zabriskie ranked third overall at 1:04 behind, and Lance Armstrong was 16th at 4:02 behind.
On Friday, the 21-year-old from New Zealand beat Leipheimer over the 16-mile course by 14 seconds. Although he started the day in 54th place, Sergent has a history of riding strong. He holds a number of high finishes in individual and team pursuit competitions in the under-23 category.
VeloNews reports that Sergent finished 3:08 behind Leipheimer over the same course last year. The difference:
“I may have matured a bit more. Last year I was learning a lot about myself and how to train properly, this year I know a lot more about how to train. Living in Boulder is nice and it’s easy to go out training there. I’m living in a house with three teammates so we’ve been doing some pretty solid rides.”
Leipheimer is riding for Mellow Johnny's cycling team, along with Armstrong and Jason McCartney (they're all members of the RadioShack team). Other ProTour cyclists at the Tour of the Gila are Danielson, Zabriskie and Tom Peterson on DZNuts (the proxy team for Garmin-Transitions).
The top five finishers on Friday were Sergent; Leipheimer at 14 seconds behind; Zabriskie at 26 seconds; Danielson at 52 seconds and Phillip Zajicek (Fly Australia) at 1:01.
The pro cyclist that put this race on the map, Armstrong, finished the individual time trial in 13th place, 1:50 behind Sergent.
Top 5 after Saturday's Stage 4
Levi Leipheimer (Mellow Johnny's) — leader
Tom Danielson (DZ Nuts) — 59 seconds
David Zabriskie (DZ Nuts) — 1:04 behind
Phillip Zajicek (Fly Australia) — 1:14 behind
Luis Amaran (Jamis Sutter Home) — 2:02 behind
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